If you’ve been around here for a while, you’ll remember that reader Mark Sturtevant raises lepidopterans for a hobby. We get the benefit in the form of developmental information and lovely pictures. Here’s the latest batch, with his notes:
As you may recall I had raised a large batch of cecropia moths (Hyalophora cecropia) last summer. Earlier this month I was kept pretty busy with the adult moths that had eclosed [hatched] from cocoons that were hidden in our family refrigerator over the winter. Here are four photos.
One of the newly emerged moths. This has pretty much expanded its wings, but is too soft yet to fly around the house.
A close up:
Moth incest!
It is easy to mate cecropias, even if they are siblings. They do not care. Some other species do not do this so readily. I obtained about a hundred eggs from these matings, and I am now rearing a small number of larvae from them. The rest I had humanely put down by freezing them. I have released this species into the wild (it is native here, and I see larvae and cocoons on occasion), but I have opted to not do that for many years.
Cecropias are the largest native moth in North America. Here are a male and a female.
Finally, here are two pictures of soaring hawks that Stephen Barnard sent me on May 20. I’ve lost the notes: I believe they’re red-tailed hawks (Buteo jamaicensis), but their tails don’t look very red to me. Readers?
Amazing moth photos, Mark!
Many of the contributors to this site do some remarkable things! The two contributors today are classic examples. I wonder what other incredible natural history vocations/avocations are to be found among the readers here?
just incredible photographs Mark and Stephen!
A friend asked what the moths were that she photographed at her mother’s and I told her they were cecropia moths. I’ve been obsessed with them for weeks now because they are born without mouth parts and only live 2 weeks. The joke I’ve been making is evolution figured if the moth was only going to live 2 weeks, it wasn’t going to spend it eating & pooping.
Yes. I am not sure of the details, but they have, I think, some vestigial mouth parts and vestiges of a digestive tract. All energy is spent in a short period of time in flying and making lots ‘o sperm in the case of males, and making a large number of large eggs in the case of females. They really deteriorate rapidly as they get older. Like salmon.
Yes, they’re Red-tails. Immature. The red tail is an adult feature.
From the look of it (same bird in both pics), It’s about to molt. The red tailfeathers will appear at the first molt.
I’m in South Texas, and I’m used to seeing “light phase” Red-tailed Hawks with very pale, unconvincingly-red tails. I’m guessing that many of them are the Buteo jamaicensis fuertesi or the Buteo jamaicensis kriderii subspecies. I don’t know how or whether their coloring changes during the transition from juvenile to adult … just that my gestalt Red-tailed Hawk has become much paler.
Mark, did you freeze the other eggs because it would be too crazy to raise that many? I imagine that is why, but I also thought maybe you didn’t want to introduce too many in the wild. Beautiful moths…though I must say I don’t think my wife would allow me to keep them in the family refrigerator. The beer fridge, yeah, but not the main fridge. 🙂
Stephen, did you mask those photos? I don’t think I’ve ever seen your bird pics with white backgrounds (except the B&W). Not seeing the sky was strange, but the photos were outstanding as usual.
Yes, it would be too crazy. I can barely manage a dozen, since once they get to be big larvae (and they get big!!) they eat a LOT. It would no longer be fun. With small numbers it is really fun (or at least I think so). They get bigger every day, and they change their colors as they advance through their larval instars.
There is an objection to releasing even native but not locally caught insects into the wild since they might carry disease. I do not personally think that is at all likely, but I have chosen to follow this rule out of caution.
Also they would pretty much de-nude our lilac bush and apple tree if the birds did not eat them first.
“With small numbers it is really fun (or at least I think so).”
Have not done so on the scale that you do, but have raised my share of lepidopterans when the kids were little, and I definitely think it’s fun too! Those that overwintered usually did so in the garage…Always amazing just how many hatch out a wasp instead!
The way you ended that, it sounds a bit like a Jack Handy Deep Thought.
LOL, thanks for the memory. I’ve got a little book of his Deep Thoughts around here somewhere–priceless!
Yeah I have that book too!
PS: As always, love your pictures!
I keep them in our vegetable drawer in a box with a label: ‘Giant pupae. DO NOT EAT!!’ My wife, who is a lot smarter than I am, is somewhat weary of my hobbies but she puts up with it. The worst I think was when I raised a lot of preying mantises, and one flew across the room and landed in her hair. We had not met when I would keep black widows, tarantulas, and scorpions. Some of those escaped and I never did find them…
I’ve found that lost tarantulas really like cat barf…
Were you married when your tarantulas escaped? If so, your wife is a saint!
You are a gnarly dude. lots o’ lol’s Insect Man
No. I was pretty young when I kept those sorts of things. My parents were extremely indulgent in the inscrutable exhortations of my soul.
Love the way Stephen’s photos let one study the plumage so well. Looks as if this juvie redtail has already shed a couple of primaries from each wing. That is one beat-up tail!
Very cool hobby. I’ve done this on a very small scale, raising Swallowtails as a school project for my children. The caterpillars exuded pungent stuff when disturbed and the children hated that smell. We had caterpillars crawling on the underside of the dining table and just about everywhere on the main floor.
Great photos, Mark and Stephen. Thank you!
I kinda raised a Cecropia once. Found the unimaginably huge caterpillar on the asphalt of the parking lot at the Pitt Bio Dept. Suspected it wanted to make a cocoon and so put it on a bush outside the new research molecular wing and then came inside and Googled giant green caterpillar to ID what I’d found. Sure enough there was a cocoon there the next day. Made sure the grounds guy knew not to trim there and checked on it periodically. Then one day in the spring the cocoon was empty.
Relatedly, all of the four academic institutions I’ve spent time at have bio buildings that have been boringly landscaped by the university (altho at W&M, bio prof JT Baldwin had a large hand in the plantings on the old campus). There must be bio depts with interesting plantings. Are any of you at places like that?
Meanwhile, re. Jim’s comment #2, I have about two doz advanced hybrid Am Chestnut trees in pots this year.
That is very uplifting!
Now someone needs to work on American ash trees…the Emerald Ash Borer has left our area with nothing but bleached tree skeletons. 🙁